8 Things You Didn’t Know a Health Tracker Could Do

From helping you quit your bad habits to monitoring your baby.

These days, one in five Americans owns a fitness tracker. They can take the shape of a bracelet, a headset, or even a shirt. Each one works slightly differently and monitors a variety of things.

1. Help you quit your bad habits

Do you have trouble getting up in the morning or wish you could stop smoking or biting your nails? The Pavlok wristband might be the solution to your problems. It is equipped with a module that you can use to shock yourself when you are tempted to indulge in a habit you wish you could break. These shocks are similar to the static ones you sometimes get from touching a doorknob. You can train yourself to associate the habit with a negative feeling instead of the reward you normally get when you indulge. If you tend to press the snooze button too many times in the morning or sleep through your alarm, you can set Pavlok to automatically shock you if it senses that you should be out of bed.

2. Stop you from slouching

The Upright posture tracker is a wearable device that can train you to sit and stand up straight. It attaches to your back and gently vibrates every time it detects you slouching.

3. Monitor your baby

Having a newborn baby isn’t easy for any parent but technology is here to help. With the Sproutling armband, you can monitor your sleeping baby from a distance and predict when he or she will wake up. The bracelet comes with three wristband sizes so that it can grow with your baby. If you’ve got people over while your child is sleeping, the bracelet can even let you know if you are being too loud and are likely to wake him or her.

4. Stop you from getting sunburnt

June’s UVA and UVB sensors monitor your sun exposure and give you the UV index to ensure that you are enjoying the sun in a safe manner.

5. Reduce Stress

Spire can be clipped to your belt or bra and will let you know when it detects that you’re too stressed. It will remind you to take deep breaths in order to lower your blood pressure and stay calm.

6.Tell you to stop being a couch potato

The Jawbone UP3 will remind you to stay active when you are idle for too long. You can program it to vibrate when you are inactive for a certain period of time — say when you are binging on Netflix and need to get up and take a walk around the block.

7. Monitor your sleep

Devices like the Microsoft band and Hexoskin can monitor your twisting and turning as you sleep and give you information about your breathing and heart rate, how often you wake up, and — in the case of Hexoskin — your sleeping position.

8. Keep track of your brain activity as you meditate

Muse functions as your personal meditation trainer. You wear it as a headband and it monitors your progress, guides you through a meditation session and measures how calm your mind is. It provides auditory feedback that gets louder as your brain gets more active and guides you back into a meditative state.